Is There Somebody Who Can Watch You?
by kyaticlikestea
Summary: While Paris is struck by the celebrations of the New Year, Grantaire's world is falling away at his feet. Out of the two of them, Grantaire is supposed to be the one who's messed up. He doesn't know how to be anything else. He doesn't know how to be the strong one, and he certainly doesn't know how to stop Apollo from falling.


Grantaire loves New Year in Paris. For the most part, he could take or leave this city. There are days when the whole place seems both empty and crowded, full of people but utterly bereft of anything that matters, and Grantaire hates it. He loathes it. He looks at the corners of the streets where the silent people live in poverty, and he hates how unmoved he is by their plight. He sees broken bottles in the gutters and dull cents by the roadside, and he wants to get out.

But then there are days spent with Enjolras, and suddenly the city – their city – is bright again, and beautiful. With Enjolras, he thinks he can see the silent people, and he can bring himself to help. He clears the streets of bottles and coins, and with Enjolras, he makes it a better place. They make it their own. He has lived here for five years and he has been in love with Enjolras for each day of every one, but he has only found this strange half-love for the city in the past year and a half, since the day that Enjolras came to him, windswept and hurried, and Grantaire was made peaceful by his kisses.

New Year, however, can only be enjoyed in Paris. Grantaire firmly believes it. It's not because of the fireworks over the Seine, nor the Arc silhouetted against a backdrop of a city drenched in promise; it is entirely because Enjolras is here, and Enjolras loves this city. The city is the marrow in Enjolras' bones, the red blood in his veins, and Grantaire thinks they exist in symbiosis; one cannot live without the other. Enjolras makes the city better, and in turn, the city thanks Enjolras by making him happy. That's why Grantaire can't even begin to imagine seeing the New Year turn in any other city. The promise of a new year can't be made without Enjolras, and it certainly can't be kept.

They have celebrated one New Year together before today, but then they had only been dating for five months, and they didn't leave Grantaire's flat. Not that Grantaire had minded, of course. Even now, he is jealous of Enjolras, and hoards their moments together like old shoeboxes – however, he is such a part of Enjolras' life now that he can't imagine celebrating New Year without Enjolras' friends.

They're in the Musain, Grantaire's bar of choice when he wants to get comfortably drunk but not obliteratedly so (Enjolras tolerates it less and less these days, and Grantaire does not want Enjolras to be intolerant of him ever again) and there are mere moments to go before they cast off the skin of the last year and live afresh in the new one. Grantaire is looking forward to it more than most, he thinks; although the last year was spent loving Enjolras and being loved in return, there are a thousand things he regrets about it, and he's eager for a new year without those mistakes.

"It's nearly time," he whispers, squeezing Enjolras' hand more tightly. Enjolras does not respond, which is most unlike him; Enjolras has an answer to everything – from statements, to rhetorical questions, to indisputable facts – and Grantaire is unused to silence from him. He looks at Enjolras, frowning slightly. Enjolras is not looking at Grantaire; instead, his attention is turned towards an empty corner of the bar. There seems to be a shadow across the other man's face, his eyes dark and his mouth a tight line. Grantaire feels something like worry flicker in his mind.

"Are you all right?" he asks, and Enjolras turns suddenly, startled, meeting Grantaire's eye with a guilty look. What he has to feel guilty about, Grantaire isn't sure.

"I'm fine," says Enjolras, and briefly casts his eye around the room.

Grantaire follows his gaze, and finds himself smiling reflexively. Behind them, he can see Enjolras' friends – their friends, he corrects himself, because although he's been part of their group for only a year or so, they have fully adopted him as one of their own – huddled together at a table in the far corner of the bar. He watches for a few moments as Jehan and Courfeyrac sit together, only a breath apart, talking about something trivial. The scene is underlined with the importance of their burgeoning relationship, and Grantaire wonders if the new year will be the chance they both need to admit how they each feel about one another. He sees Marius and Cosette - Cosette on her boyfriend's lap, her arms around his neck as they stare lovingly at each other – and, despite the cliché of the image, Grantaire is oddly moved by the couple, how they spend hours like this, lost in themselves, and yet not a second is wasted. He glances to the left of Marius and Cosette and his heart falters a little as he notices Éponine watching the two of them, her face careful but not stoic enough to conceal her envy completely. Next to her, Combeferre is trying valiantly to distract her with a little origami swan that he's fashioned out of one of Enjolras' pamphlets.

Enjolras needs to see this, thinks Grantaire. He spends hours on those pamphlets, fact checking and proofreading until the sun is ripe, and Grantaire knows how Enjolras feels when he sees those pamphlets put to waste, discarded on seats after meetings and folded into hats and frogs by Jehan.

He turns to point Enjolras' attention towards Combeferre's clearly unforgivable misuse of his very important pamphlet, but Enjolras' attention seems to be elsewhere. Quite where, Grantaire is unsure. His eyes are turned in the same direction as Grantaire's, but he can't be watching their friends because his expression is anything but fond. His gaze is unfocused and glassy, and Grantaire wonders what it is that he is seeing that makes him so ghostlike.

"Are you sure you're OK?" asks Grantaire, because Enjolras still looks tired, like he'd rather be anywhere but here.

Before Enjolras can answer, Grantaire feels a pair of hands on his shoulders, and turns to find a positively jubilant Éponine, beaming wide and carelessly. He steals a glance back at Enjolras and sees his mouth fall shut, any answer that might have been forthcoming now silenced. Grantaire resolves to ask him about it later.

"Happy New Year!" cries Éponine, a fraction of a second before the rest of the bar explodes into excited cheers and screeches of the same thing, and Grantaire feels his worry about Enjolras fall away with the last stale seconds of the previous year. As the clock above the bar strikes midnight, Grantaire's friends rush over and before he knows it, he is lost in a tangle of arms and mouths – he thinks his friends would call it a hug, but he's fairly certain that the dictionary would disagree – and after several seconds of ecstatic celebration, he feels someone press a drink into his hand and drag him away from the group.

"Jehan?" he asks, and his friend beams, lifting their drink – a pint of Guinness, Grantaire notes with both admiration and revulsion – and clinking it against Grantaire's own. Grantaire looks down and sees that Jehan has bought him a small glass of scotch. He's impressed. Jehan has always been intuitive, and although they're certainly not the closest pair in their circle of friends, he's not surprised to find that Jehan knows more about him than Grantaire had given them credit for.

"It is I," confirms Jehan, swaying slightly from the alcohol and New Year's buzz. They're wearing a purple, floor-length sequined dress, paired with scuffed army boots, and Grantaire thinks it says a lot about his life here that no-one in the bar even bats an eyelid. He likes it. He remembers his childhood, the years misspent in judgemental neighbourhoods in the small hills of the South; the contrast between his watchful old neighbours and the people with whom he now surrounds himself is so stark that he often wonders how he survived the past at all.

Jehan clears their throat, and Grantaire snaps his attention back to his friend.

"Did you want something?" he asks, and Jehan nods sombrely.

"It's about next year," they begin, and frown. "Well. This year, maybe. Whatever year we're in now. I just wanted to talk to you about a collaborative idea I had, you know, about combining your artwork and my poetry... I think it would go down an absolute storm in Marseilles next year. Really next year, I mean."

Grantaire nods slowly, taking it in. He's never been one for collaborative efforts. He's too selfish, or perhaps he's not selfish enough - doesn't have the confidence in his own work to believe that it could possibly help someone else's to shine. Whatever his reasons, he's never brought himself to consider it before.

But Jehan is different. He knows that. Jehan is so talented that it makes Grantaire ache sometimes. He reads their words and he hurts in a different way every time. Jehan's poetry is like an old bruise; familiar, painful and fragile.

Jehan waves a hand airily.

"I don't expect an answer right away," they say. "I know what you're like with your work. You could win every prize and accolade under the sun and you'd still refuse to exhibit. But trust me, Grantaire, I think this could be good. For both of us. You know, to get our names out there."

It could, thinks Grantaire. It really could. Enjolras is always telling him to make more of his talent, to do something with his work, and this could be the chance Grantaire has never wanted to prove to Enjolras that he can be something, that he can do something right.

He has an answer already.

He scans the room quickly to catch sight of Enjolras, and spots him almost immediately. He's standing at the other end of the bar, glass of what looks like lemonade clutched in both hands, and Combeferre is talking to him while Joly and Bossuet listen, rapt. He looks better, Grantaire thinks, but busy. They're probably discussing next week's rally in the suburbs. The last he heard of it, Bahorel had come to Enjolras with an offer from a friend to do the security, and Grantaire expects that this is what they're discussing. No-one is overly enthusiastic about the idea of Bahorel's friends taking charge of security - they've all seen the bruises on Bahorel's face after returning from a night out with them - but Enjolras has confided in Grantaire that they don't have any other option.

He turns his attention back to Jehan, who is regarding Grantaire with an amused quirk of their eyebrow, and Grantaire spreads his palms benevolently.

"I'm listening," he says. "Tell me all."

And Jehan does. They tell Grantaire all about their idea – and it's a good one, Grantaire can admit, with Grantaire illustrating Jehan's words just as Jehan builds upon Grantaire's images – and Grantaire is so enraptured at the thought of how he might be spending the year ahead that he doesn't even notice the time pass by until Musichetta, the bar owner, taps him on the shoulder and tells him it's closing time. He bids Jehan farewell with a smile and a promise to think about it – although truth be told, he doesn't need to think about it to know that he's never been more excited about a potential project – and heads towards the corner of the room where Enjolras and Combeferre are sitting, embroiled in a quiet but heated discussion.

As Grantaire approaches, the two men look up, and Enjolras' face becomes blank. Combeferre sighs.

"He's all yours, Grantaire," he says, standing up and dusting an imaginary speck of dust from the trousers of his corduroy suit. "I hope you have better luck with him than I did."

Grantaire frowns as Combeferre leaves, and turns to Enjolras.

"What was that about?" he asks.

Enjolras shrugs. "We had a disagreement," he replies.

"That's not so unusual," Grantaire says. "You're always arguing with someone about something."

Enjolras closes his eyes, and Grantaire can see that he is not in the mood for Grantaire's comments. He still looks exhausted, which is perhaps unsurprising given the late hour, but still. Enjolras is often up late and rises early, and he never looks even a little tired.

"I'm sorry," says Grantaire. "I didn't mean - "

"It's OK," interrupts Enjolras, and he opens his eyes, fixing Grantaire with a reassuring smile. "Really. I'm just tired, that's all. Combeferre wanted to talk about the rally, and I didn't have the energy. Let's just go home."

And in weeks to come, Grantaire thinks, he'll kick himself for not noticing the signs, that Enjolras is never too tired to talk about his causes, but he doesn't push the matter. He never asks Enjolras about his melancholy, and Enjolras is fine when they get home. Until he's not.

* * *

January is a treacherous month, thinks Grantaire. Having started with a week of clear sunshine, crisp and freezing, it has diminished into day after day of lukewarm rain and dreary skies, all pretence of sunshine lost. It's still dark when he wakes up to his alarm, telling him in the certain tones of Bastille that it's ten o'clock and he really does have to get up and go to work, and he sighs in distaste as he turns the alarm off.

Bleary-eyed and fumbling, he throws the sheets off the bed as he always does, and pads towards their bedroom door. He's about to open it and grab a quick shower before heading to work via the patisserie – croissants make even the longest shift seem short and sweet – when he hears a disgruntled groan. Furrowing his brow, he turns around, and there is Enjolras, still lying in bed but now bereft of bedcovers.

The sight is so unfamiliar that Grantaire actually wonders for a split second if he might be dreaming. Enjolras is never in bed when Grantaire gets up. It's actually sort of a running joke between them at this point. Grantaire remembers Enjolras' sister's wedding, when Enjolras had had to employ the rather underhand tactic of initiating a round of incredibly satiating morning sex to ensure that Grantaire didn't stay in bed all day and miss the ceremony. Grantaire is not a morning person in much the same sense that Marius quite likes Cosette; if the opportunity arose, Grantaire is certain that he would quite happily lie in bed until his stomach growled for want of lunch or dinner.

Enjolras is the polar opposite of Grantaire in this matter. Where Grantaire could stay in bed until the afternoon, Enjolras is never asleep after seven o'clock. At the first light in summer, Enjolras is awake and dressed, showered and already starting work on his next rally speech. In winter, Enjolras will rise long before the sun. Grantaire has always thought it to be both a repellent and endearing habit; repellent because he himself could never even begin to imagine taking up such a routine, and endearing because everything Enjolras does is endearing.

Today, however, it is ten o'clock, and Enjolras is still in bed.

Grantaire frowns and walks back over to the bed, sitting at the end of it and holding the bedcovers, not yet replacing them over Enjolras' body, even though he must be cold; their apartment is heated on a timer, and it's been off for the past hour.

He doesn't know what to say.

"Don't you have classes today, baby?" he finally asks, testing the term of endearment in the cold air between them. Enjolras is not one for nicknames. He rolls his eyes when Marius calls Cosette 'honey', and is tolerant of Grantaire's tendency to call him 'Apollo' only because it is personal, and entirely a name of Grantaire's own invention.

Grantaire expects him to roll his eyes, but Enjolras doesn't.

"I don't feel well," he replies, facing away from Grantaire and keeping his eyes closed.

Grantaire remembers last May, when Enjolras had managed 100% attendance in the first year of his PhD despite an attack of mumps, but says nothing about it.

"I can take the day off, if you like, to look after you," he begins instead, and Enjolras curls into the foetal position in response.

"No," he says, over the slight rustling of the sheets. "It won't help. You'll just lose a day's pay for nothing. I'll be fine."

"You don't look fine." And he doesn't; his skin is waxy, his hair tangled, and Grantaire suddenly aches. He reaches out to draw the sheets over Enjolras' body, and Enjolras flinches at the touch. Grantaire recoils instantly, feeling as though he's been bitten – rejection is a sort of bite, he thinks – and Enjolras opens his eyes, looking immediately remorseful.

"I'll see you later," says Enjolras, and he manages a small half smile that does absolutely nothing to reassure the gnawing, ebbing worry in Grantaire's gut that something is very, very wrong here. "Have a good day."

Grantaire will not have a good day, he knows; he'll spend all day worrying about Enjolras. Still, he nods, returning Enjolras' almost smile, before leaning down and pressing a brief kiss to his forehead.

He leaves their apartment feeling as though he's left something very important behind.

As always, his shift at the Corinth drags on. He serves some regular patrons, but can't quite bring himself to enjoy their usual banter, and when he has to serve new customers, he doesn't manage to strike up the friendly connection for which he's famed, which makes people become regulars. And it's irritating, because Grantaire is good at this. He's good with people, and he's good at this job. He wasn't hired for nothing. And yet he's making schoolboy errors, trivial mistakes, all for worrying about Enjolras.

Halfway through his shift, after he's accidentally served alcohol to a teenage boy without asking for ID and then spilt a bottle of beer on some woman's silk scarf, Éponine pulls him to one side, her lips pursed. He knows that look. He's seen it a thousand times before, a brief warning before Éponine puts him to rights. He's known her for five years, ever since he first came to Paris – a terrified art student from a small town, blinking and bewildered in the city lights – and she became his city guide, a streetwise girl of his age with a full-time job in a bar and a pierced tongue even more cutting than his own.

They've grown up now, he knows. They've come a long way from the days of drunken revelry before 9am art classes and shifts, drinking vodka by the Seine and dancing to chase the stars from the sky. They're the same, but different. Their youthful freedom has been dulled somewhat by the years.

One thing hasn't changed, though, and that's Éponine's irrefutable ability to put Grantaire in his place. He sighs, awaiting the barrage of well-intentioned tellings-off.

It doesn't come.

Instead, Éponine takes his hands in her own and regards him carefully. He returns her gaze, and she softens.

"What's wrong?" she asks.

Grantaire shrugs. "Bad day," he replies. It's not exactly a lie.

Éponine huffs. "Grantaire," she says, "I have seen you naked." At this, an elderly patron at the bar lifts his head in interest, and Grantaire shudders. Éponine doesn't so much as flinch, continuing in the same vein. "I have cleaned up your vomit from around your toilet, and I have gone to the corner shop at two in the morning to buy you vodka and tissues because you were – and I quote – sad, horny and alone."

"Yes, thank you for the unnecessary trip down embarrassing memory lane," mutters Grantaire, and Éponine smiles wryly.

"My point is this, darling," she says. "You really, really don't need to be embarrassed around me. Whatever it is you're hiding, you can spit it out. I won't judge you for it. Did I judge you when I caught you watching He-Man with Gavroche?"

Grantaire feels his face flush. "No," he admits. "But this is different, Ép. I'm not embarrassed. It's just... it's different, that's all."

Éponine narrows her eyes almost imperceptibly, and Grantaire drops his gaze. She sighs.

"This is about Enjolras, isn't it?" she asks, and Grantaire nods, still staring at the floor. There's a fresh red wine stain by his feet. He hopes Éponine hasn't noticed. It looks like blood.

"He hasn't done anything wrong, before you ask," Grantaire tells her, after a few moments. "He's ill. He hasn't gone to class."

Éponine sucks in a sharp breath. "Shit," she says. "That bad?"

"Yeah," affirms Grantaire. "That bad."

"Well, fuck," says Éponine, rubbing a small circle in the skin between Grantaire's thumb and forefinger reassuringly. "But Enjolras never misses class."

"I know," says Grantaire, and he looks up at her again. She looks worried, and he feels a curl of something stronger than worry in the pit of his gut, because Éponine doesn't even like Enjolras. She hasn't liked him since Grantaire stumbled into the Musain four and a half years ago, drunk on wine and something like despair because Enjolras didn't like him. She still associates the Enjolras of today with the younger and more callous Enjolras of those early years, Grantaire knows, and for all that time has eroded Éponine's youthful freedom, she can't bring herself to believe that it's also weathered Enjolras' pride and terribleness.

If Éponine is worried about Enjolras, then Grantaire is right. There is something horribly wrong.

Éponine swallows, and then fixes a bright smile across her thin features. "You need to take your mind off it," she says. "You look awful, Grantaire. You know that I love you, but honestly, you look like you've just caught someone murdering your cat. You need a drink."

Grantaire raises an eyebrow, and she flushes. Of all his friends, she has found it the hardest to admit that Grantaire has cut down on his drinking out of necessity. He wonders if she thinks he's doing it because of Enjolras, and if that's why she resents the decision. If she knew what Enjolras knew, he thinks, if she knew that his tongue was sharpened to knifepoint by the dull bottom of a wine bottle, and that his words had cut his friends to ribbons, then she wouldn't question it. She would thank Enjolras, if she still believed it to be his work.

"All right," she amends. "A very small drink. But you know what I mean. You need to get out of that apartment for an evening."

"I'm not sure," he replies, chewing his lip. "If Enjolras is ill, then I don't want to leave him. He might need me."

Éponine raises an eyebrow. "That's what mobile phones are for," she counters. "And besides, you're not at home now. He told you to come in today, didn't he? I bet he did."

Grantaire doesn't answer, and she correctly takes his silence as agreement.

"I knew it!" she crows. "Look, Grantaire, you know I don't love the guy. You know that. But you do, and I love you, so by default I support your relationship. I'm not telling you this because I want to cause an argument. I'm telling you this because you need a break. I barely see you outside of working hours any more. Do you even go out?"

Grantaire shrugs again. "Sometimes," he says, and it's not untrue. He met Jehan and Courfeyrac for brunch last week – they called it brunch but, being a trio of late-risers, it was 4pm by the time they'd even agreed on a café to meet at – and he and Enjolras went to an exhibition at the Louvre the weekend before. They'd made a full weekend of it, at Enjolras' insistence, booking a room at a hotel nearby, despite living only ten stops away on the Metro. They'd eaten at an expensive restaurant on the Saturday and drank at a dive of a bar on the Sunday, and they'd gone home on the Metro, holding hands and arguing good-naturedly about the place of art in a decaying society. It had been fun. Grantaire had glowed, and Enjolras had shone.

"You need to get out more," is all Éponine says, taking in his distant smile as he reminisces. "Call Enjolras. Text him. Whatever. We're going out after work, and if he doesn't like it, then he can come with. Either way, you're going out, with or without him."

Grantaire sighs. He can't deny that the thought is appealing. He thinks of his apartment: cold and dark, as it was that morning, and of Enjolras alone in the bed. He thinks of the Musain: warm and bustling and inviting, and of Éponine's raucous laughter and gossip.

He knows which appeals most, although he's not going to pretend that he doesn't feel guilty about it.

"All right," he agrees, and Éponine beams. "Seeing as you'll only henpeck me more if I don't."

"You know me so well."

She offers him one last warm grin before turning to admonish the eavesdropping patron, and Grantaire takes his phone out of his jeans and composes a quick text to Enjolras, explaining that he'll be back later in the evening, before sending it with a picture of Éponine explaining the concept of privacy to a browbeaten old man. He shoves his phone back in his pocket and tries to ignore the gnawing hint of remorse that's threatening to eat through his heart.

The rest of his shift passes more smoothly now that he knows that Enjolras is aware of his plans, and five o'clock rolls around more quickly than Grantaire had anticipated. He works efficiently with Éponine to clean up before Abel and Laurine come to take over their shifts, and he's out of the Corinth by quarter past, holding onto Éponine's arm like a nervous prom date.

"To the Musain?" Éponine asks, and they both know that it's not really a question. Grantaire nods, smiling.

"Just let me check my phone," he says, and takes his phone out of his pocket. He doesn't really expect Enjolras to have replied. Enjolras isn't hugely fond of texting, being more of an orator than a writer, and so it's not really a surprise when there's no response.

Éponine looks at him. "Any word from his lordship?"

Grantaire shakes his head. "I think he's probably gone out," he says. "There was a Classics lecture in my old campus hall that he was thinking of going to."

Éponine pulls a face. "How fascinating," she says.

Grantaire shrugs. He doesn't know how to explain to her that Enjolras' interest in the Classics comes solely from Grantaire's final year thesis and subsequent exhibitions. He doesn't know how to tell Éponine that Grantaire had taken Enjolras to every Greek-inspired exhibition, every research seminar about Castor and Pollux, Pylades and Orestes, in the months before they first kissed. He can't put it into words how their relationship might never have come to fruition if it weren't for the rapture in Enjolras' eyes as he listened to the odysseys of Nisus and Euralys. How he owes their first meeting to wine and Enjolras' love of social justice, but he owes their every last meeting to Patroclus and Achilles.

He doesn't even try. Éponine is in love with Marius because he called her beautiful when they were both drunk and lonely, and she doesn't know of anything else. Not yet.

"It is to us," he says instead, and he pats her hand. "Shall we go, then?"

They go.

By the time Grantaire returns to their apartment, he feels warm and fuzzy from two glasses of wine. He unlocks the front door without fumbling, fingers not trembling from intoxication, and he allows himself a moment to feel proud of his control. He is not drunk. He is tipsy, and it is enough.

It is enough.

He pushes open the door, listening to the creak of wood on varnish, and closes it firmly, dropping his keys in the ashtray by the latch. The apartment is still dark, with all the lights off, although the heating has come on recently. He can hear the faint gurgling of the boiler, and the air feels thick.

Enjolras has gone out after all, he supposes. It's not late; although it's pitch black, it's not yet nine o'clock, and it's not unreasonable that Enjolras should still be out. He often meets with Combeferre and Courfeyrac late in the evening to go over plans and events, and sometimes Grantaire goes with him, but more often he doesn't. He'll never miss a meeting, but Enjolras' rendezvous with Combeferre and Courfeyrac are private. For the leaders only. Grantaire is neither a leader nor a follower, and he is perfectly content with discussing other people's beliefs only once a week at their Saturday meetings.

Toeing the door closed fully to the click, Grantaire turns on the living room light. The room is bathed in a dull glow almost immediately, and it's home. There's a growing patch of mould on the ceiling above the front window – they should really get that looked at, Grantaire knows, but it'll only grow back – and the wall adjacent to the kitchen area has gained a damp stain the shape of Italy, but it's home. The heating makes the air hang hot and humid like old clothes, and Grantaire is home.

He takes a deep breath and flings himself onto the sofa. Éponine was right. He did need to go out. It had been a good evening. He had laughed with Éponine about Marius' haircut – he does look slightly like a poodle, although Cosette fully approves – and when Feuilly and Bahorel showed up by chance, Grantaire had been brought up-to-date on their lives. He learnt that Bahorel's friends are banned from doing the security at any more of Enjolras' rallies after one of them started a fight with a sixteen year old girl, and that Feuilly is considering opening his own business at some point in the year.

In turn, he told them of his planned collaboration with Jehan – he's started work on a painting already, based on one of Jehan's most recent poems, although he didn't tell them any of the details despite their eager questioning – and of his trip with Enjolras to the Louvre. Feuilly had agreed that it was a weekend well spent. Bahorel and Éponine had exchanged baffled glances. Grantaire had even managed to refuse Feuilly's offer to buy him another drink without causing any offence.

Yes, it had been a good evening, and Grantaire has never been so happy to be home. He wonders if Enjolras will be interested in Feuilly's news when he gets back. Enjolras has always been a keen supporter of local businesses, always favouring artisan cafes over the myriad Starbucks of the inner city and eschewing reasonably priced supermarkets for more expensive independent shops. It's not always been particularly beneficial for their rent payments, but it makes Enjolras happy, and so Grantaire encourages it. He thinks he would encourage Enjolras to pursue the life goal of becoming a piranha trainer if he thought it would make Enjolras happy.

He yawns, suddenly aware of how utterly shattered he is. He's spent six hours on his feet and three more in a busy room, and his head thumps. Ordinarily, he'd wait for Enjolras to get home and coax him to bed early with the suggestion of lazy, languid sex, but this evening – for some reason – he's not in the mood for that. He needs a nap, he thinks. Perhaps when Enjolras gets back, he'll be slightly more energised. He really does like lazy, languid sex.

Stretching, he heaves himself up from the sofa and heads towards the bedroom, which is so dark that it looks like it's soaked in ink; the curtains are drawn, presumably to retain the heat, and not even a shard of moonlight pierces through. Grantaire sighs, momentarily rueing his dark little apartment, before flicking on the light switch, letting his eyes adjust before trying to find where the hell he threw his t-shirt last night (things had been neither particularly lazy nor languid last night, not that Grantaire had minded).

His eyes adjust, and Grantaire blinks, his heart dropping almost audibly in his chest.

Enjolras is in bed.

Grantaire lifts a hand to his mouth, and he can feel himself start to tremble. It's not from the alcohol, he knows, and the worm-like sensation of nausea in his belly isn't drunkenness either. He is worried. Enjolras is in bed, and he is worried.

"Enjolras?" he whispers, pulse thudding and voice shaking. Enjolras sniffs and stretches his arms out over his head, opening his eyes and looking at Grantaire, and Grantaire's stomach drops even further. Enjolras' eyes are tired, so very, very tired – whether it's from lack of sleep or too much of it, Grantaire can't be sure.

Enjolras clears his throat. "I told you," he says, voice dry and hard from exhaustion. "I don't feel well."

He stares at Grantaire, as though challenging him to comment on it, and Grantaire opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He doesn't know what to say. There is nothing to say, because this hasn't happened. It can't have. The front door was still locked from when Grantaire left this morning, and Enjolras hasn't woken up all day. This isn't Enjolras. This can't be. This man is quiet and there is nothing behind his eyes, no fire or flame of passion or belief, only empty anger, and Enjolras hasn't woken up.

Grantaire swallows, and Enjolras blinks, his fierce glare not faltering, and Grantaire falters instead.

"OK," he says quietly, and he peels off his shirt, stepping out of his trousers and toeing off his socks, and turns off the light. The room is shrouded in the black mist of winter night-time, and Grantaire would imagine himself alone if it weren't for the steady sound of Enjolras' breathing.

Perhaps he is alone, and Enjolras' breath is mere hallucination. It would almost make more sense.

In the darkness, he picks his way across the floorboards, taking care not to slip on his scattered clothes, and climbs into bed next to Enjolras. The sheets on this side are cold, and Grantaire wonders if it's any warmer on Enjolras' side. For some reason, he doubts it. He doesn't try to find out.

Moments pass, or perhaps it's hours; without the rise and fall of the moon, or the steady touch of skin on skin, it's hard to tell. Enjolras and Grantaire do not sleep apart. They fall asleep as they wake; entangled in a knot of limbs, warm and touching, and never like this. Never two lonely people in one bed.

After an indeterminable stretch of time spent alone in the darkness, Grantaire feels the bed sheets shift on Enjolras' side. He remains still, feigning sleep, keeping his breaths low and even. There's a small rush of cold as the sheets move and allow the now unheated air from the room to creep under them, and then Enjolras is back, his knees resting in the crook of Grantaire's thighs, his arms snaking around Grantaire's chest, his body warm against Grantaire's back, and he is there.

Grantaire doesn't move, afraid of frightening Enjolras into moving away. Instead, he remains stock still, and Enjolras sighs. Grantaire can feel his breath against his shoulder.

"I'm sorry," says Enjolras, his voice small and quiet in the vastness of the dark room, and Grantaire's heart thuds so heavily that he's sure Enjolras can feel it. "I don't know what's wrong with me."

Grantaire doesn't answer, and after a few moments, Enjolras sighs again, and Grantaire feels him shift himself into a more comfortable position, his arms wrapped more tightly around Grantaire.

He falls into something like sleep after within moments, or perhaps it's hours.

When he wakes up, he is alone, and he can smell coffee. Still half asleep, he goes into the kitchen. Enjolras is sitting at the table with a pot of coffee, the newspaper and a pile of notes on his forthcoming speech. When he notices Grantaire, he grins sheepishly and pushes over the newspaper.

"I saved the crossword," he says, by way of greeting. "Well, I filled in Four Across, because it was 'optimism', and I didn't think you'd get it."

Grantaire sticks his tongue out and Enjolras raises an eyebrow in mock distaste, pushing the pot of coffee across the table.

"Don't I get a cup?" asks Grantaire.

"Get your own cup, you lazy ruffian," says Enjolras, and freezes. It's almost unnoticeable, but Grantaire is finely attuned to Enjolras and he can't help but spot the way his eyes still from poring over his notes. Grantaire thinks he knows why; perhaps Enjolras is expecting a barb about which one of them is really lazy. After all, it was Grantaire who got out of bed yesterday.

But Grantaire is content to keep surprising Enjolras, and so he simply shrugs and heads towards the cupboard, poking Enjolras in the shoulder on his way over to reassure him that he's not angry, and he doesn't think he's imagining the relief that ghosts across Enjolras' face.

"Three Down is 'Dionysus'," says Enjolras, as Grantaire takes his seat again. "I thought you'd like that one, so I left it for you."

"Well, you've told me now."

"You'd have found it in seconds."

"I would have."

The kitchen smells like coffee and companionship, and Enjolras is awake.

They don't talk about yesterday.

* * *

The Musain is blissfully quiet on Saturday evenings, which has always surprised Grantaire. He's always thought that it should be busiest at this time, with weekend drinkers and weekday workers coming together to create a cacophony of noise and movement.

That's not the case, though. Although the lower floor of the bar might be almost full – Grantaire doesn't know, but he can hear the odd rowdy patron here and there – the upstairs area is empty but for Grantaire and his friends, and Grantaire is thankful for it. The temptation to drink is always heightened when he's around crowds of drunken people, and none of his friends here are so much as approaching that state. Not even Grantaire. He looks down at the glass in his hand. It's only small, filled with whisky bought for him by Jehan – well, it would have been rude to refuse – and he grins, because he knows that it will be both his first and last of the evening.

Next to him, Courfeyrac sighs. "I'm starting to think that he's going to be late," he says, shifting in his seat with impatience.

Grantaire looks at the clock on the far wall. "The meeting's not due to start for another five minutes," he replies. "He'll be here."

Courfeyrac worries at his lip, and draws a blank face in the condensation on his beer glass. "Maybe," he acquiesces, "although let's be honest, if Enjolras isn't ten minutes early, he may as well be late."

It's true, Grantaire knows. Enjolras has always been of the mind that tardiness is a concept made for people who aren't him. Lateness is not something that he has ever understood or condoned. It's been a bone of contention between the two of them throughout their relationship, with Grantaire viewing lateness as one of life's greatest gifts. They're stolen minutes, he thinks, and if a man can steal something as grand as time, then he should want for nothing. Enjolras, predictably, usually scoffs at this philosophy.

The clock marks a few more seconds, and Courfeyrac drums his fingers arrhythmically on the table. There is silence but for the faint tap of fingers against wood, and then Jehan sighs.

"If he doesn't show up within the next four minutes, I am going to braid his hair right after the meeting," they say, picking petulantly at a hole in the sleeve of their jumper – a hideous hand-knitted confection in all the wrong shades of blue. "I'll braid the shit out of it. That'll show him."

"He's not even late," counters Grantaire, although Enjolras is late by his own definition of the word, and Grantaire doesn't know why.

"Flowers," says Jehan, a sinister tone in their voice. "I'll plait his perfect hair with roses and poison ivy."

"The meeting hasn't started yet!" Grantaire insists. Jehan pouts in response.

"I hope he's all right," mutters Joly, and Courfeyrac rolls his eyes.

"He's fine," he says. "I'll bet he's just got caught up in planning next week's protest. We have to find new security, remember?"

From the adjacent table, Bahorel raises his voice. "My guys are still willing," he pipes up, and there's a groan of disbelieving laughter from almost everyone.

"Not fucking likely," says Courfeyrac. "You're lucky that friend of yours didn't end up in jail for assault!"

"It was a minor quibble," sulks Bahorel.

"He broke her nose!"

"She deserved it."

"She was 16!" interjects Joly.

"Well, she still deserved it."

Combeferre stands up suddenly, his chair raking across the weathered floorboards and making Grantaire wince.

"Enjolras will sort it," he says, a tone of warning in his voice that no-one misses, and Courfeyrac sticks his tongue out. Bahorel responds by pushing his nose up and making a grotesque face. Courfeyrac wrinkles his nose in disgust.

"Oh my God," mumbles Jehan. "And this is why we need Enjolras."

"We really do," agrees Combeferre, sitting down again.

Grantaire downs the rest of his whisky. He could really use another one. He wonders if he has time to sneak downstairs and order one before Enjolras arrives, and then feels horribly guilty for even considering it. He has had a drink. He does not need another one.

God, he needs another one.

Combeferre eyes him strangely from across the table, and Grantaire swears silently to himself.

"Are you all right?" asks Combeferre, and Grantaire nods too briskly to convince.

He feels Courfeyrac squeeze his shoulder reassuringly.

"He'll be here soon," says Courfeyrac.

Grantaire wonders what it says about him that his friends think that he's driven to drink by the thought of Enjolras being only one minute early to a meeting. Then, he wonders what it says about himself that his friends are entirely correct in their assumptions.

"Yeah," he says, and forces some sort of smile.

Combeferre frowns. "Is there something else wrong, Grantaire?" he asks. He sounds worried, and for a moment, Grantaire almost believes that he is worried for him, but then Combeferre continues, "Is Enjolras all right?" and Grantaire can't quite quash the disappointment he feels at the revelation that of course Combeferre is worried about Enjolras and not Grantaire, because Grantaire is only here for Enjolras, isn't he? Without Enjolras, there's no point in Grantaire being here at all.

The thought isn't a new one – it's so old at this point that it's almost stale in its bitterness – but it still stings.

"Enjolras is fine," Grantaire replies tersely, and stands up, shaking Courfeyrac's hand from his arm. "I'm going to get a drink."

Combeferre blinks rapidly, and pushes his chair out as though he's going to stand up too, before thinking better of it and looking at Jehan helplessly.

Jehan looks at Grantaire. "He didn't mean it like that," they offer, and Grantaire shrugs.

"You only bought me a small glass," he counters, emphasising the first word, driving home the point that Grantaire didn't buy his first drink.

Jehan looks down at their lap, guilty, and Grantaire purses his lips so he doesn't say anything he might regret, and lose the moral high ground. He goes to get a drink.

On his way downstairs, he bumps into Enjolras – whose sense of timing is clearly, as always, impeccable – who is making such a mad dash to get upstairs before he's officially late that he almost doesn't notice Grantaire. He does, though, and his expression changes from hurry to concern.

He takes Grantaire by the arm, pulling him to the side of the staircase, and frowns.

"Are you leaving?" he asks.

Grantaire momentarily toys with the idea of lying. Perhaps leaving would be better, anyway. Perhaps the disappointment that Enjolras might feel at Grantaire missing one of his precious meetings would be far less harsh than the disappointment he knows Enjolras would suffer at seeing Grantaire drunk.

But this is Enjolras, after all, and Grantaire has never lied to him, and he's not about to start now.

"I was going to get a drink," he answers, and Enjolras' face falls. "Don't pity me."

"I never pity you," says Enjolras, and he rubs small circles into Grantaire's skin. "I only worry about you."

"Well don't."

"Then don't give me any reason to." Enjolras looks at Grantaire, eyes imploring. Something bends inside Grantaire, bends and bends and finally breaks, and he slumps, resigning to always give in to Enjolras, and never to himself.

"Let's go upstairs," says Grantaire, and Enjolras beams, although Grantaire thinks that there's still something darker behind his eyes. Something like worry, perhaps, or sadness. It's hard to tell in the dim light of the Musain.

It makes him brave, the thought that Enjolras is troubled and unwilling to share it, because Grantaire has always been a coward when it comes to admitting his problems and it's never done him any good. It makes him want to be anything but scared now, because if Enjolras falls into the same trap as Grantaire, then they might both as well be doomed.

"Why were you late?" he asks. "I mean, you're never late."

Enjolras' gaze flits from Grantaire's face for a moment, unfocused and hesitant, and then he looks back at Grantaire and lifts one shoulder in a slight shrug.

"I had things to do," he says. He lets go of Grantaire's arm and claps his hands together, and Grantaire knows they are finished talking about this for the moment. "Shall we go upstairs?"

Grantaire never does get that second drink, but he doesn't stop thinking about it either.

* * *

Enjolras has always been in perfect health. It's sort of hilarious, really, because – as usual – Grantaire is the polar opposite; always ill in some way or another. When he's feeling particularly daring, Grantaire comments that it's probably due to Enjolras' good breeding. In truth, it's probably a combination of Enjolras' staunch veganism and refusal to drive anywhere he can walk, but it's much more amusing to watch the dangerous tilt to Enjolras' eyebrow that comes to Enjolras' eyebrows only when he feels that he's being made fun of.

So, considering Enjolras' record, Grantaire is more than a little confused when he comes home from work, plops himself on the sofa ready for a very sedentary few hours, and promptly sits on a very uncomfortable packet of pills. Enjolras has never taken so much as a paracetamol, and Grantaire frowns as he picks up the packet and squints to make out the name. He never understands the logic behind naming these things; they always seem like endless strings of letters to him, just vowels and consonants beaded together into a word that's too long for anyone to pronounce on the first attempt, and this packet is no different. It's just a long word, so unfamiliar that it might just as well not be a word at all, and the name doesn't mean anything to Grantaire.

He turns the packet over in his hand, brow still furrowed in confusion, and reads the information. The first thing he notices is a list of side , nausea, muscle pain, mood swings, dizziness, weight gain, insomnia, he reads.

He thinks back to the previous night, when Enjolras had come home early from a meeting with Bossuet and Combeferre, and how he had looked so pale and ill. Grantaire had put it down to Enjolras being overworked, but as he reads over the list of side effects on the pill packet again, everything slots into place.

It's almost odd how relieved he feels, because he finally has an answer. He knows why Enjolras has been sleeping more, and he has an explanation for Enjolras' inexplicable mood swings, and it's no longer a mystery as to why Enjolras tosses and turns at night, sleeping instead in the early hours of the morning – often into the late hours, too. It's the answer he's been trying to find for the past month.

And yet it's not a relief. Not really. Not at all. It's something else entirely, because Enjolras is taking these pills for some reason, and Grantaire doesn't know why.

He flips over the packet again and scours the front of the box for any more information. It's carefully blank. Grantaire supposes it's intentional, so that the people who take the pills won't be embarrassed when they're found by their nosy boyfriends between the sofa cushions, but still. It's not helpful. All he manages to get from the front of the packet is that each pill contains 20mg of something called citalopram hydrobromide – which might as well be in German, for all that Grantaire understands it – and that pharmaceutical companies should probably invest a little more money in their graphic design teams.

He's about to open the packet when he hears the bedroom door opening behind him, and he drops the packet immediately. He turns to see Enjolras, sleep-rumpled and yawning. He looks as though he's just woken up, although he's fully clothed, so Grantaire supposes he's taken a nap rather than stayed in bed all day, which is an improvement on last week.

Grantaire offers a smile, and curses himself for his inability to hide his guilt when Enjolras' expression falters, changing from exhaustion into nervousness.

"What are you doing?" asks Enjolras, and Grantaire shrugs, aiming for nonchalant but ending up with suspicious.

"I just got in," he replies. "I was going to watch TV for a bit. I think the news is on, if you want to join."

Enjolras makes no move. Instead, he narrows his eyes, and Grantaire feels his heart-rate jump.

"What were you looking at when I came in?" asks Enjolras, more specific this time, and Grantaire swallows hard.

"Just..." He fumbles around, gesticulating nondescriptly for a few moments before sighing and giving up. This is Enjolras. He doesn't lie to Enjolras. He won't.

He picks up the pill packet from behind the sofa cushion, where he'd shoved it in his vain haste to hide it from Enjolras. Enjolras' face darkens instantly, and Grantaire's breath hitches in his throat. They don't have secrets. They never have. And yet it's very clear that this is supposed to be just that.

"Those are mine," says Enjolras eventually, his voice careful and low.

Grantaire figures that he's already in too deep. He might as well drown.

"What are they?" he asks, holding the packet out in a gesture of openness, and Enjolras doesn't meet his eye any more.

"It doesn't matter."

"It matters to me." He isn't angry, not really, but he's frustrated. He's confused at the fact that Enjolras insists on transparency at all times – that Enjolras will readily tell Grantaire everything about himself, and expects Grantaire to offer him the same courtesy in return – but has completely hidden this. It hurts, Grantaire realises. He was used to being lied to, once, but that was years ago, before Paris left its mark, and he's not used to it any more. "It matters that you didn't tell me. That you won't tell me."

Something shifts in Enjolras at that, and he closes his eyes. He looks defeated, Grantaire thinks, and it's a startling revelation, because Enjolras has never looked defeated, not ever, and yet here he is, standing in their living room, and he's never looked so small.

"They're anti-depressants."

Grantaire blinks, and he wonders if it's possible for someone's world to shatter like old glass at 5pm on a Friday.

Perhaps he misheard. He must have. Enjolras can't be taking anti-depressants, because Enjolras is Enjolras, and he isn't depressed. He can't be. Enjolras gets up and works and studies and laughs and inspires, and he isn't depressed. He is serious and wild, beautiful and terrible, and he can't be ill. Not like this. He's a vegan, for goodness' sake. Depressed people don't plan successful rallies and lobby for political change in their spare time between scoring perfect marks on their PhD papers, do they? Depressed people sit in dark corners and talk to whisky bottles like old friends, and they cry in the streets. Grantaire has seen them.

Enjolras smiled three times yesterday and argued with Combeferre about the nature of society's responsibility towards the impoverished, and he is wonderful.

Except sometimes Enjolras stays in bed all day and turns up late for meetings, and sometimes he looks at things so distantly that Grantaire wonders if he really sees anything at all.

Grantaire wets his lips to speak, but nothing comes out. He doesn't know what to say. He doesn't have the vocabulary for this situation. He shouldn't need it.

"Why are you taking anti-depressants?" he asks eventually, and the words sound wrong.

"Why do you think?"

Enjolras shifts his weight from his left foot to his right and clasps his hands behind his back, and he looks so afraid that it's all Grantaire can do not to rush over and hold him until he isn't afraid any more. He's not sure he can do that, though, and so he settles for dropping the packet of pills onto the coffee table in front of him and extending his arms towards Enjolras, inviting him to sit on the sofa next to Grantaire, and Enjolras does. He sits with his hands folded in his lap, frozen and averting Grantaire's eye, like he's worried that he's not allowed to touch Grantaire, and Grantaire is sure that he feels his heart break a little. He reaches out and wraps his fingers around Enjolras' wrist, taking comfort in the solidity of the little bones, and he's grateful that at least one part of Enjolras is unchanged. He is made of the same things he always was.

"How long?" Grantaire asks, and Enjolras remains still, gaze focused solely on the coffee table.

"Three months," he answers.

"Three months?" Grantaire repeats. Enjolras looks at him finally. "You didn't tell me. You could have told me."

Enjolras shrugs, and chews his lip for a second. Enjolras never has to think before he speaks. Sometimes, Combeferre says, Enjolras would do well to break that habit, but Grantaire can't remember a single time that Enjolras has said anything other than what needed to be said. His words can be cutting, caustic, but they are never wrong. Now, he is choosing his words, and that scares Grantaire.

"I didn't know how to be that person," are the first words he chooses to say, and it sounds like a confession. "Everyone always thinks I'm the better person, but I'm not, am I? Not if I'm like this." He smiles sadly, and it's such a fragile thing that Grantaire wants to frame it before it fades forever, because he's starting to wonder when he'll next see Enjolras smile. He reaches out and places his left hand on Enjolras' jaw, stroking what he hopes are reassuring touches on Enjolras' temple. Enjolras meets his eye, and the smile falters, but doesn't break. "I can't be Apollo when I can't even be myself."

The nickname is seldom formed on Enjolras' tongue, and Grantaire recognises the irony of the situation – that Enjolras can only speak the name when he's denying it. And it's fine, Grantaire realises, because he doesn't need Enjolras to be Apollo. He doesn't.

Once, Apollo had been a perfect boy; clear cut words of revolution in the upstairs of the Musain. He had been tumbling hair and rosy lips and red jackets, and he had been enough. Then, Enjolras had been so imperfect that it made Grantaire ache. He had been white-gold hair scraped into a bun; he had been a heavy sleeper and a coffee drinker and a freckle on his hip, and he had been everything.

Grantaire can't articulate it. That's why he paints: because he never has the right words. It crosses his mind that he has painted Apollo, but never Enjolras.

"I don't want you to be Apollo," he says, and Enjolras looks down at his lap where Grantaire's right hand still holds his wrist delicately. "I want you to be yourself."

"I've tried. I'm trying. It's been harder these past few weeks," says Enjolras.

"Why?"

Grantaire doesn't mean for the question to sound like an accusation, but it comes out that way all the same. If Enjolras has noticed, though, he doesn't so much as flinch.

"I don't know. It's just getting harder."

The thought of Enjolras suffering makes something inside Grantaire ache, and he looks at the other man, at how drawn his face is, how completely finished he looks, and he wonders if he's been blind for a very long time.

"How long have you felt like this?" he questions.

Enjolras shrugs again. "Maybe six months. Seven, perhaps."

"But we went to the Louvre," is the first thing that Grantaire can think to say, and it sounds ridiculous out loud, the words hanging in the air between them like a bad joke, but Enjolras doesn't flinch. "You were fine."

He had been fine, hadn't he? They'd looked at old paintings and laughed at the improbable contortions of the subjects. They'd made fun of the monkey-like dogs in the Renaissance paintings, and Enjolras had let Grantaire pretend to waltz him around the Greek statues. They'd laughed, and Enjolras had seemed fine.

"I was with you," says Enjolras. "It was enough."

"But it's not now?"

"It is sometimes." Enjolras finally meets Grantaire's eye again, and he seems more resigned than anything else. It does absolutely nothing to reassure Grantaire. "It's hard to explain."

"You don't have to. I just wish you'd told me," Grantaire tells him, and Enjolras nods slowly.

"I really am sorry," he says. "I don't mean to be..." He waves his free hand around airily, and huffs a sarcastic laugh. "I'm terrible at this."

Grantaire doesn't know what he means by 'this'. Enjolras has always been terrible at talking about his feelings, although he's improved upon Grantaire's insistence that they actually discuss their problems with each other instead of arguing and blurting out cruel truths. But it's entirely possible that Enjolras is referring to this new thing, this alien illness that seems to threaten to tear at the edges of everything that makes Enjolras who he is, and Grantaire doesn't know how he can tell Enjolras that it will be all right when he doesn't know that it will.

Grantaire chooses to accept the first meaning.

"I wouldn't have you any other way," he says, and it seems as though he's said the right thing because Enjolras smiles at him again, a genuine smile that reaches his eyes, and he leans forward and kisses Grantaire.

It's only brief, but it's enough that Grantaire can tell that Enjolras still tastes the same, still feels as he always has, and he starts to think that perhaps a packet of 20mg pills doesn't need to mean that much after all.

* * *

Enjolras is late to the next meeting. Combeferre puffs out his cheeks and exhales, clearly bored, and Grantaire draws dots on his glass of coke with his index finger in the condensation.

"Why is he late this time?" asks Bossuet.

Next to him, Joly prods Bossuet in his side, and Bossuet lets out a yelp that startles Marius into ending his make out session with Cosette, something for which Grantaire is inherently grateful.

"He has a lot on his mind," is Grantaire's idle response, and if Combeferre narrows his eyes at that, then Grantaire can pretend he doesn't see.

Enjolras arrives ten minutes later, and although his hair is pulled into a lazy, loose bun, his speech is perfect.

* * *

A week before Valentine's Day, Enjolras surprises Grantaire by waking him at 7am to make love. There's no reason for it, not as far as Grantaire can discern, and it's like it used to be, in the days before 20mg pills and late meetings. It's a little like coming home.

Enjolras goes back to sleep afterwards, and doesn't get up until Grantaire has to be at work for his 11am shift.

* * *

Éponine leans on the bar at the Corinth, and eyes Grantaire warily.

"Something's going on with you," she says. "You seem different today."

"In a good way or a bad way?" Grantaire asks flippantly, and that startles a laugh out of her.

"Honestly? I'm not sure," she replies, and starts tidying the bottles that the last patron left. "It's like you've been busy, and now you're not."

Grantaire shrugs.

"I'm always busy," he says, fixing her with a saccharine smile. "You make sure of that."

Éponine swats him with a tea towel.

"Ha-ha," she says sarcastically. "But no, really. Are you all right? The last time I spoke to you about it, Enjolras was acting weird. Did you ever get to the bottom of that?"

Grantaire considers the question, and for a moment, he really thinks that he'll tell her the truth. He thinks he'll tell her about the time Enjolras snapped at him for getting up too late on Monday, and then slept until gone midday on Tuesday. He thinks he'll tell her about the way Enjolras always looks tired now, even when he's smiling, and about those 20mg pills. He has always told Éponine the truth. But then he thinks that this is not his truth to tell, not really; it is Enjolras', and if Enjolras hasn't told anyone else, then it's not Grantaire's place to do it for him.

"Yeah," he responds, trying to sound as casual as possible. "We worked it out."

Éponine narrows her eyes, but doesn't press the subject.

"Good," she says. "I'm glad to hear it. Now, are you going to help me clean up this shit, or are you just going to stand there and look pretty?"

He rolls his eyes in mock irritation and she cackles, throwing him a cleaning cloth. He pokes his tongue out at her and she returns the gesture, and for a moment, everything is all right.

It feels wrong, lying to Éponine, but the alternative feels worse.

* * *

Grantaire's phone rings when he's on his way to work, and he scrabbles about in the deep pockets of his outdoor jacket trying to find it.

"Hello?" he says breathlessly. He's already ten minutes late, and although he knows Éponine will cover for him, he's fully aware that he'll pay for it later. Last time, she made him clean her shoes for a week. Éponine has a lot of shoes.

"Hello," says Enjolras.

Grantaire grins, shifting his phone from his left hand to his right so as to shield Enjolras' voice from the noise of the road. "I saw you five minutes ago."

He hears Enjolras sniff dismissively, and Grantaire laughs.

"I just thought I'd phone you to tell you how much I enjoyed this morning," Enjolras says.

Grantaire raises an eyebrow. "You mean the fucking?"

There's a pause then, and Enjolras' reply is sheepish when it comes. "I'm in public."

Grantaire snorts. "So am I. You can just say it. Fucking."

An old woman heading down the pavement in the opposite direction to Grantaire shoots him a disgusted glare, and Grantaire returns it with a cheery salute. She shakes her head, pottering off, and Grantaire laughs.

"I'm at the patisserie. There's a queue."

"Ah. Better not say it, then."

"No." He can almost hear the wry smile in Enjolras' voice, and he stifles another laugh. "Better not."

Grantaire shifts his phone back into his other hand and exhales. His breath makes a little white cloud, and he briefly wonders if it'll join the air and become part of the atmosphere for all eternity, shared atoms for other men and women to breathe.

"Grantaire?" comes Enjolras' voice, and Grantaire snaps back into reality.

"Yes, sorry."

"You were having deep existential thoughts again, weren't you?" Enjolras sounds amused, and Grantaire finds himself flushing. A woman smoking a cigarette on the front steps of her house catches his eye and smiles.

"The deepest," he admits.

Enjolras laughs, and his voice sounds warm. "I'll leave you to your ruminations, then," he says. "I'm going to buy some macarons for Combeferre. I thought it might go some way towards thanking him for his work on the rally last month."

"Don't give any to Bahorel," Grantaire returns absent-mindedly, and then thinks about the conversation they've just had; about how calm Enjolras sounds, and how happy. "You sound good," he adds.

There's a short pause, and Grantaire wonders if he's overstepped the mark by talking about something that Enjolras doesn't really want to discuss, but then he hears a small breath of what sounds like surprised laughter, and Enjolras is there.

"I feel good," he says.

These words are all that Grantaire wants to hear, and he decides to push his luck by asking for clarification, so he knows that he's allowed to rejoice in this. "Really?"

"Really," affirms Enjolras. There's a sigh then, and Enjolras says something indeterminable, his hand over the mouthpiece to muffle his speech. When he comes back, he sounds rueful. "I have to go," he says. "They're trying to ask me what colour I want, as though it really matters. I'll see you later. Love you."

"Love you," says Grantaire, and Enjolras hangs up.

He can remember a time not so long ago when saying I love you to Enjolras felt like he was desecrating something beautiful, like his very love could scratch scars into marble and tear wounds into silk. It doesn't feel like that any more. It feels sacred, almost, something that shouldn't really be said on a bustling street on the outskirts of Paris. But then Grantaire has never been one for consecration, and he's never been one to hide how he feels.

He wonders when he first started to think that he deserves to let Enjolras know that he loves him, and he thinks they're both very glad that he did.

* * *

He finishes his shift on Wednesday and goes straight to Jehan's house. They have a lot to discuss regarding their project, and they tend to meet twice a week, although this is already the third time that Grantaire has seen Jehan since Sunday. They're on something of a roll with their latest piece – their fourth already, and Grantaire is confident that they'll have a complete exhibition ready to polish by June – and neither of them wants to interrupt the creative process any more than their other commitments already have.

They're sitting cross-legged on the floor in the middle of Jehan's living room, papers and canvases spread about the place so that not even an inch of carpet is visible, when Jehan puts down the pen they've been chewing for the past half hour and beams.

"I think I've finished this one," they say, tucking behind their ear a strand of hair that's escaped from their braid. They've braided it with ribbons, Grantaire is amused and unsurprised to see, and the green and blue strands run through their red hair like thin rivers of contrasting colours. From a distance, Grantaire thinks, Jehan could be mistaken for a painter rather than a poet. At least until the scribbled notes and nonsensical half lines of prose became noticeable, black and stark in ink against the paper white skin of Jehan's arm.

Grantaire finishes sketching the last faint line on his canvas and sets his pencil down gently, at a perfect right angle to the drawing. It's far from finished, he knows, but he has a good idea of where he's going with it. Based on a haiku of Jehan's that includes the line 'fall like tarnished butterflies', he's sketched a detailed autumn scene. He'll find a way of making it more interesting when he comes to the colouring. That's his favourite part, anyway.

"OK," says Grantaire. "Can I read it?"

Jehan bites the tip of their pen again, running their eyes over their sheet of paper. Grantaire can see the main body of the poem in the middle, with the snaking arms of Jehan's notes reaching out from the centre like winter branches. Grantaire thinks he reads the words ashes and embers, but he's not sure. Jehan's writing is terrible, like black spiders on snow.

Jehan taps the pen twice on the corner of the paper, then looks up at Grantaire. "No," they say. "I don't think you're ready to see it yet."

Grantaire narrows his eyes. "Why not?"

Jehan shrugs. "I don't know, really. I just have a feeling that it's not the right time." They meet Grantaire's eye apologetically. "I'm always right about these things, you know."

Grantaire remembers when Jehan had presented a portfolio of poems to Cosette and Marius at a meeting last March, with the cryptic message that they'd known this day would come. Marius and Cosette had opened the portfolio and gasped at each poem; sonnets and ballads, tanka and free verse, all about the dawn of new romances and the fear of losing old ones. Jehan had written them over a year previously. No-one else had known that Marius and Cosette were dating.

Grantaire sighs dramatically. "Then I suppose I'll wait. I'm sure it's good, though."

Jehan beams. "It is. I'm excited for you to see it." They fold the piece of paper over so that Grantaire can't pry any more, and fold their arms in their lap. "I can give you something else, though."

Grantaire snorts. "I know what your idea of a present is, and thanks, but no thanks."

Jehan pouts. "You loved the snow globe I bought for your birthday!"

"It had a photograph of a sarcastic camel in it," Grantaire points out. "I've never shown any particular predilection for camels before, sarcastic or otherwise."

"Well, pardon me for trying to culture you," sniffs Jehan, and they reach behind them and tug on their braid, pulling at the strand of green ribbon. It falls free from the braid easily, slipping out like a thoughtless word, and Grantaire wonders how it had managed to stay in Jehan's hair all day. Jehan holds out their hand and solemnly presents the ribbon to Grantaire.

Grantaire raises an eyebrow. "Why are you giving me a ribbon from your hair?" he asks.

"Because it's Valentine's Day."

"Jehan, you know I'm very happy with Enjolras - "

Jehan raises their other hand, cutting Grantaire off, and shudders. "Don't even finish that sentence. I love you, Grantaire, but giving you a Valentine's gift would be like sending condoms to my mother. No, this is for you, because I know that Enjolras likes green on you. It's a good colour for you."

Grantaire blinks. "My hair isn't long enough to wear it," he states, pointing at his mess of short dark curls.

"Firstly, any hair is braidable with the right amount of patience and skill," Jehan says dismissively, "and secondly, you are not going to wear it in your hair. Give me your wrist."

Wordlessly, Grantaire does so, feeling as though he's been shifted into a parallel universe where this sort of thing makes sense. Jehan ties the ribbon around his wrist, finishing it with an elegant bow, and grins triumphantly, looking up at Grantaire.

"There," they say. "Now you are dashing and prepared for your date with Enjolras tonight. Are you going anywhere special?"

Grantaire shakes his head. "Not really our scene," he replies. "Enjolras thinks that Valentine's Day is a Hallmark holiday, invented by the capitalist hegemony to sell cards to the placid masses, and I'm just too lazy to do anything for it."

"How romantic," Jehan states flatly.

Grantaire shrugs. "It works for us," he says. "And hey, I'm in a committed relationship. I'm pretty much guaranteed to get laid tonight, unlike some people."

Jehan raises an eyebrow. "I have my own plans for tonight, you know," they say, "involving an array of foodstuffs, some hot and heavy consensual sex, and Courf – "

"As glad as I am that you've both got your shit together, if you finish that sentence, I will end you." Grantaire shudders at the image, then sighs, checking his watch. "I'd better be off. I told Enjolras I'd be back before dark."

"All right," Jehan acquiesces, getting to their knees and helping Grantaire up. Jehan sees him to the front door and opens it, leaning against the frame as Grantaire stands on the step to tie his scarf. "Tell Enjolras I said 'hello, you divine, gorgeous man'. Those words exactly. Nothing else will do."

"I tell him that every day," Grantaire says, mock serious, and flashes Jehan a grin. "Tell Courfeyrac that I hid a box of condoms in your spice rack last week. He'll need them."

"I would, but he might get jealous." Jehan salutes Grantaire, and goes inside. "Goodbye!"

"See you," calls Grantaire, making his way down the steps.

It's bitterly cold, the weather well rooted in freezing February tradition, and Grantaire finds himself shivering all the way back to his apartment, even though it's a walk of ten blocks.

On his way home, he passes a small bookshop, and smiles reflexively. It's closing down now, and he's half disappointed that it's past 5pm and he can't go in. He remembers when he had first visited it as a second year art student just trying to get out of the torrential rain, and had immediately fallen in love with the Classics section at the back of the shop. It was warm in the way that only bookshops ever really are, with the smoky smell of old books and dust, and he'd spent an hour sitting in an old dining room chair with a book of Greek mythology spread across his lap.

He'd brought that book to Enjolras' meeting that evening, and the stunned look on Enjolras' face had been worth the 6€ he'd spent on it. The book is on the bookcase in their living room now, and Grantaire knows that Enjolras reads it sometimes when he can't sleep.

When he finally arrives at the warmth of his apartment building, the first thing he smells is smoke. He sighs. Mrs Baudelaire in 24B has a rude son who comes to cook for her in the evenings, and the building more often smells of burning than not. Shrugging off his coat, he heads up the metal staircase towards his apartment, wrinkling his nose at the smell. He's half tempted to call the fire brigade in the hope that they'll ban Mrs Baudelaire from having any culinarily impaired visitors. He reaches his apartment on the fourth floor feeling slightly out of breath, and he wonders if he can sue the Baudelaires for smoke inhalation. He doubts it.

He turns the handle of his front door and closes his eyes. It's been a long day.

"I'm back! Are you – Jesus, mother of Mary, is that a barricade?"

He blinks, certain that he's hallucinating, or has walked into the wrong flat. On the breakfast bar that separates the kitchen from the living area, there is a mountainous heap of kitchen utensils; all their frying pans and saucepans are piled high, precariously leaning at dangerous angles, and their cutlery and crockery is balanced in between the cracks. The pile is a good half a metre high, and Grantaire could have sworn that they didn't own this much shit.

From behind the heap, Enjolras' head pokes out.

"Oh," says Enjolras, frowning slightly, and he looks at the pile disinterestedly. "No. It's the washing up."

"The washing up," says Grantaire monotonously, and he blinks heavily again. "Of course it is. Why is it there, and why is there so much of it?"

Enjolras huffs, blowing a loose strand of blond hair out of his face, and fixes Grantaire with a patient look. "Well," he begins. "I was going to cook something for you, seeing as it's Valentine's Day and we didn't have any other plans, and I got out one of the frying pans and I saw that it wasn't clean. There was something stuck to it." He frowns. "I think it was egg."

"You were going to cook?" Grantaire says, because Enjolras doesn't cook. He can't. There are two things that Enjolras is genuinely terrible at, and those are poetry and cooking. Grantaire thinks he might even be worse at cooking than he is at poetry, and he once tried to rhyme 'revolutionary' with 'how things might be'.

Enjolras nods. "Pasta," he says.

"Why did you need the frying pan to make pasta?" Grantaire asks. He can feel a headache coming on, right between his eyes.

Enjolras frowns. "Don't you need a frying pan to cook pasta?"

"Not if you want to eat it," Grantaire sighs. He rubs the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, and thinks about the whisky in the top drawer under the sink. "Anyway, why did the discovery of the dirty frying pan lead to the piece of modern art on our breakfast bar?"

"It's more of an island than a breakfast bar," muses Enjolras, scratching his chin thoughtfully.

Grantaire can feel something curling in his gut. He feels like he's still in the strange universe he entered at Jehan's, where everything looks the same but nothing quite makes sense, and he doesn't like it. Enjolras is never unfocused and he doesn't cook. But then Enjolras doesn't sleep until 11am and take 20mg tablets either, so they're already treading new ground. Perhaps this is a side effect.

"The washing up," Grantaire reminds him.

"Oh," says Enjolras. "I just thought that I might as well wash everything, seeing as I was already washing the frying pan."

"Everything?"

"Well, yes." Enjolras looks at him like it's the most obvious thing in the world. Noticing Grantaire's carefully concerned look, he sighs. "It's done now. We should probably go out to eat. We don't have any pasta anyway."

Grantaire nods slowly. "So, we're celebrating Valentine's Day this year?"

"Why not?" says Enjolras.

"Because you think it's a gross exaggeration of capitalistic values in a society that values money over true displays of emotion," points out Grantaire.

"Fair point," says Enjolras. "But I want to go out."

Grantaire blinks. "Have I fallen into another dimension?" he asks himself aloud. "Another realm where my boyfriend builds a fortress out of kitchenware and wants to go out on Valentine's Day?"

"I can go out by myself if you don't want to come," says Enjolras, folding his arms.

Grantaire scoffs. "On Valentine's Day? Not likely. You'll get hit on by all the lonely singletons in the bar, and you'll come home two hours later filled with nothing but overpriced lemonade and a sense of disenchantment at your own physical beauty." He picks up his coat from the floor. "If you're going out, then I'm coming with."

Enjolras doesn't so much as blink. "Fine."

"Fine," returns Grantaire.

"The Musain?" suggests Enjolras, unfolding his arms and turning to go into the bedroom.

Grantaire rolls his eyes. "You old romantic."

* * *

They get to the Musain within the hour, after Enjolras has considered three different jackets in slightly varying shades of red and finally settled on a blue one. Grantaire isn't surprised to find Éponine already there, sitting at the bar with Combeferre and Bahorel, drinking rather expensive rum and ruminating about the likelihood of Marius and Cosette getting out of bed for long enough to join them.

They settle on 'unlikely'.

"You lovebirds decided to descend from Mount Olympus on this sacred day after all?" grins Combeferre, slapping Enjolras on the back in a fashion that's entirely too macho to suit him.

"Saint Valentine is a Roman deity," replies Enjolras haughtily, and Combeferre pulls a face. "Mount Olympus is Greek." He turns to the bartender. "I'll have whatever they're having."

"It's strong stuff," warns Éponine, shooting Grantaire a confused look. Grantaire just shrugs back at her. He's as perplexed as she is.

Enjolras raises his eyebrows. "I can handle it," he says defensively, and Éponine throws up her hands in mock surrender.

"Didn't say you couldn't, champ," she says, and Grantaire exhales heavily. He thinks he preferred it when Enjolras thought Valentine's Day was too marred by capitalism to be worth celebrating. It was certainly less stressful.

"What are you drinking, Grantaire?" asks Bahorel, putting his hand companionably on Grantaire's shoulder.

"Just coke for me," he says, mouth suddenly dry.

Éponine frowns. "You having rum with that?"

Grantaire shakes his head. "Not today." He smiles weakly, and gestures towards Enjolras, who has already knocked back his first glass and is halfway through ordering another. "One of us has to stay sober enough to open the front door. It's a really fiddly lock. You have to twist the key just right."

Bahorel nods and turns to order Grantaire's drink, and Éponine places her hand on the crook of Grantaire's arm, her face furrowed with concern.

"Are you all right?" she asks quietly, and Grantaire nods. He's being asked that a lot lately. He wonders if they know that they're asking the wrong person.

"Fine," he replies tersely.

She bites her lip, and Grantaire knows that something is coming. He steels himself.

"Enjolras is acting a bit strangely, don't you think?" she says.

Grantaire makes no movement. "He's just trying to unwind," he replies. "He's been busy lately."

Éponine scoffs. "He's always busy," she says dismissively. "It doesn't usually drive him to the bottle."

"He's allowed a night out, isn't he?" Grantaire is aware that he sounds more defensive than he intended, but he's getting fed up of being questioned. Everyone he meets seems to want to ask him something else, and it's never something he wants to answer.

Éponine purses her lips, and tightens her grip on his arm. "Honey, he's allowed all the nights out that he wants. It's just that he's never wanted them before."

"Well, everyone's allowed to change their mind every once in a while," he says.

Éponine looks like she's about to say something else when Bahorel comes over again and shoves a glass into Grantaire's hands. Grantaire raises it to his nose gingerly, and Bahorel laughs, a loud, raucous thing that makes Éponine jump.

"I haven't spiked it, you know," he says, and Grantaire flushes.

"I know," he lies, because he's never pretended not to have trust issues. "Force of habit, that's all."

"Well, you know, if you were slightly prettier," says Bahorel, and Éponine and Grantaire both shove him harshly at the same time. He laughs again, raising his hands. "Hey, I'm joking!"

"It's hardly a laughing subject," says Combeferre, his tone disapproving, and Bahorel sighs.

"Sorry," he says. "Been hanging out with the security guys too much, I think. They've got to me."

"Well, see that you get them off you." Combeferre raises an eyebrow, and Bahorel whimpers. Grantaire can't stifle a grin at the sight of Bahorel, a two-time bare fist boxing champion, cowering from a man dressed in corduroy. "You know we won't tolerate that."

Grantaire decides to lighten the mood then – after all, they're here to celebrate love, not war – and he does a little impression of Bahorel, raising his hands and imitating Bahorel's usual deceptively stoic expression, and Éponine bursts into hysterics. From the bar, Enjolras starts to grin, and then his grin dissipates and becomes something else entirely, something raw and careless, and he gets down off the bar stool and steps over to Grantaire. He takes Grantaire's wrist in his hand and pulls up Grantaire's sleeve, exposing the green ribbon that Jehan had tied there earlier. Grantaire had completely forgotten it was there.

"Jehan," he says, by way of explanation.

Éponine and Bahorel nod understandingly, but Enjolras raises his head and meets Grantaire's eye with a look of suspicion. Grantaire's pulse begins to quicken, and he wonders if Enjolras can feel it where he's still holding his wrist.

"Why did they do that?" asks Enjolras, and Grantaire shrugs, a nervous laugh escaping him.

"Why did they tie a random bit of green ribbon around my wrist?" he says, aware that he's gabbling but powerless to stop it. "I don't know; because it's Jehan and they do that sort of shit?"

"Enjolras," says Combeferre warningly from behind the group.

Enjolras ignores him. "Green is a good colour on you," he says.

"That's exactly what Jehan said," responds Grantaire. He knows he's said exactly the wrong thing immediately. Enjolras' face darkens, something akin to anger crossing his alcohol-flushed features, and he drops Grantaire's wrist.

"I bet it is," he says, and Grantaire can hear Éponine swear under her breath.

"Enjolras – " says Grantaire.

Enjolras holds up his hand, effectively silencing Grantaire, and turns back to the bar.

Grantaire looks around himself, unsure as to what just happened. He knows that he's been accused of something, although for the life of him, he's not sure what. Enjolras knows about his collaboration with Jehan. He'd encouraged it from the moment Grantaire first mentioned it. He's sat for hours with Grantaire, talking about ideas and laughing at some of the worse ones, and when he was too tired to get up, he would still occasionally call out suggestions to the living room where Grantaire was working.

So it makes no sense, not one iota, that Enjolras should be jealous now.

Grantaire looks at Combeferre helplessly, wondering if it's obvious that his heart is beating twice as fast as normal, and Combeferre sighs. He rests a hand briefly on Grantaire's shoulder and then thinks better of it, looking behind him to check that the gesture wasn't seen.

"I'll talk to him," he promises.

Grantaire nods. "Thank you," he says.

Combeferre nods in return. He lingers for a second, then turns and takes the seat next to Enjolras, who is sitting with a face like thunder before a glass of what looks like beer.

Éponine sighs, and pats him on the shoulder. Bahorel shifts his weight from foot to foot, clearly uncomfortable.

"Come on, sparrow," says Éponine. "Let's get you drunk."

And they do.

When Enjolras eventually finds him several hours later, Grantaire is laughing hysterically at an awful joke that Bahorel has made. He turns his laughter off like a tap upon seeing Enjolras, and Enjolras sits at their table wordlessly, swaying slightly as he makes his way over. Grantaire doesn't laugh much after that.

They get home late that night, when the sun has already begun its fight in the blue grey sky, and they shed their clothes like skin as soon as they get through the door. They fuck, and it makes Grantaire ache inside because despite what he likes to call it, despite the profanities that he uses to describe it when he wants to make Enjolras blush attractively, they never fuck. Not really. They have sex, sleep together, make love – but they don't fuck.

Enjolras turns over on his side when they're finished, and they don't touch again.

* * *

Four days later, Grantaire is sitting in the upstairs of the Musain with Marius, Éponine and Combeferre. There's no meeting, and they're not expecting anyone else. Grantaire and Éponine have the day off, having persuaded Laurine and Abel to take their shifts. They'd planned to spend their time shopping for Joly's birthday, but just as they'd left Éponine's flat, Grantaire had received a text message from Marius calling for all his available friends to meet him at the Musain. Grantaire had been slightly bemused by the fact that Marius had considered him enough of a friend to invite him, and he hadn't planned on turning up at all, but Éponine is incorrigible in all matters pertaining to Marius, and so they went.

Grantaire taps his fingers on the corner of the table.

"No Cosette today?" he asks.

Marius flushes. "We're not joined at the hip."

Grantaire, Éponine and Combeferre look at each other, and promptly burst into hysterics.

Marius pouts. "We're not!"

"Oh my God, really?" says Grantaire incredulously. "Do you not see yourselves? You're always together! It's like she's your shadow, or your reflection."

Éponine visibly slumps, and Combeferre pushes his biscuit across the table to her. Marius doesn't notice either gesture.

"They're in love, Grantaire," says Éponine, her voice thick, and Marius beams.

"See, Grantaire? Éponine understands!"

Éponine unwraps Combeferre's biscuit and bites into it, her face surly.

Marius takes the spoon out of his coffee cup, and grins at Grantaire. "Anyway, what about you and Enjolras? You're always together, too. You can't talk!"

Grantaire feels his face grow red, and he looks down at his coffee. "Yeah," he says quickly. "I suppose. He's in class at the moment though, so, you know."

He looks back up at the others. Combeferre is eyeing him strangely. Éponine is too busy trying not to look at Marius, who is swirling the milk in his coffee with his teaspoon and watching it intently.

Combeferre stands up. "I'm going to get a cup of Earl Grey," he says, and gestures towards Grantaire. "Come with me?"

Grantaire is well aware that it's not really a question, and so he nods. Éponine looks at him desperately, presumably unwilling to be left alone with Marius, but Grantaire shakes his head and she slumps again, folding her arms and staring sullenly at her cappuccino.

When they reach the staircase, Combeferre pulls him aside. He looks wary, and Grantaire wonders what he's suspicious of. Grantaire is used to people being suspicious of him, but he doesn't know what he's done to merit it this time.

Combeferre clears his throat, and Grantaire steels himself.

"Is something wrong with Enjolras?" asks Combeferre.

Grantaire swallows. "I don't know," he says.

It's not a lie. He could tell Combeferre about the pills, but then he'd have to tell him about how he was fine last week, until he wasn't. He doesn't know how to articulate what's wrong, or even whether there is anything wrong. Can there be something wrong when it's sometimes right?

Combeferre shuffles his feet, and someone passes them on the stairs. Grantaire wishes they were somewhere more private.

"I know about the anti-depressants," says Combeferre after a few moments.

Grantaire balks. "What."

"He told me last week. He said that you knew."

"I do know," Grantaire returns, slightly defensive. "I just didn't know that you did."

"Enjolras is my best friend," says Combeferre, eyebrow raised. "Frankly, I'm surprised it took him this long to tell me." He purses his lips. "You should have told me."

Grantaire folds his arms and meets Combeferre's gaze squarely. "Why?" he asks. "Because you're his best friend? Because you deserved to know?"

"No," says Combeferre, placing his hands on Grantaire's shoulders. "Because you don't deserve to be alone in this."

"I'm not alone," argues Grantaire, shaking himself free. "I have Enjolras."

Combeferre sighs. "Grantaire," he says. His voice sounds tired. "You don't have to fight me on this. I'm not trying to usurp you, or step in where I'm not wanted. I promise. I'm just trying to help."

"I don't need your help," hisses Grantaire. And he doesn't. Hasn't he managed perfectly well by himself for his whole life? He has Enjolras. That's enough. It's more than he deserves.

Combeferre exhales slowly. "If you change your mind, then I'll still be here."

"I won't."

Combeferre scratches the back of his neck, and it's clear that he wants to say something else, but isn't sure how Grantaire will take it.

Grantaire sighs. Whatever it is, it's not as though it can be worse than anything else he's heard recently. He just wants to go home. The morning has turned sour, and he thinks that only Enjolras can make it otherwise.

"Spit it out," Grantaire tells him.

Combeferre purses his lips again. "This won't go away," he says finally. "I know you're probably thinking right now that it's just a case of waiting it out, but it's not. It's more a case of adapting. Things aren't going to be the same. Maybe not ever. Do you know that?"

"You don't know what you're talking about," Grantaire tells him.

Combeferre looks soft around the edges, Grantaire thinks, and he wonders why he doesn't look angry. Combeferre never looks angry. Not like Enjolras. He wonders if that's why Enjolras gets on with Combeferre in ways he doesn't with Grantaire. Enjolras and Grantaire are different in all the ways that matter, and the same in all of the rest. He thinks that Combeferre and Enjolras might be just the opposite.

"Did I ever tell you about my mother?" asks Combeferre.

Grantaire scoffs. "Why would you tell me about your mother?"

Combeferre looks at him imploringly, and Grantaire resolves to listen. It feels like he's being told a secret, and he ought at least to try to hear it.

"My mother was schizophrenic."

"Enjolras isn't schizophrenic."

"I know that, Grantaire. I know. But she was ill, for a long time." He rubs his left elbow absent-mindedly, and drops eye contact with Grantaire. "At the time, it was like it happened overnight. One day she was my mother, and the next she was someone else." He looks at Grantaire again, and Grantaire swallows hard. "But when I look back at it, it wasn't overnight at all. There were signs. There were always signs. One month, she painted our kitchen red for no reason at all. She spent so much time planning it, getting the best painters and builders, that it seemed totally unfeasible that it was a symptom. She seemed so normal doing it. But it wasn't normal, was it? Painting an entire room red and not explaining why." He huffs a small, bitter laugh. "It turned out that she painted it to block the ultraviolet rays."

The look he gives Grantaire is half fond, half devastated, and it feels both like a warning and a consolation.

"I'm sorry," mutters Grantaire. There's nothing else to say.

Combeferre shrugs. "Nothing to be sorry for," he says. "There was nothing to be done. We didn't know. How were we supposed to know what we were looking out for? We didn't know she was ill until it was too late."

"What happened to her?" Grantaire asks, hoping that he's not crossing into unwelcome territory.

"She was hospitalised a few months later," Combeferre answers. His voice is carefully blank, not betraying anything, but his hand is trembling on his arm. "And then the inevitable, I suppose. She didn't want to be helped. She was lost, really, somewhere up here." He taps his temple. "And I do think sometimes that we might have found her again if she'd let us in. But she didn't, and we lost her. It's been seven years now, nearly eight."

He shrugs again, and Grantaire sees his Adam's apple bob in his throat. He feels like he's been bruised. Combeferre has been carrying this weight with him for years. He's been pulled down with the sadness of what's happened to him, and yet he's still offering to help hold Grantaire up. Suddenly, Grantaire can see why Enjolras values him so highly. He's only sad that he's been blind to it before. He feels a dull sense of empathy at Combeferre's plight, but he can't hope to share it, because no matter how similar their situations might be at the root, they have grown into very different things.

"I'm really sorry," he says.

"Yes, well," says Combeferre, pulling himself up and smiling sadly. "You didn't know. No-one does, except Enjolras. And you, now. I know why you didn't tell me about Enjolras, because I didn't tell anyone about my mother. But this is different. We know Enjolras. We love him, perhaps as much as you do, in our own ways. We want to help. We can help."

"I don't think Enjolras wants help," says Grantaire. "He has the pills."

"My mother had her pills too. It might not be enough."

"If it's not, then he knows we're here." He emphasises the 'we' to show willing; to prove to Combeferre that he's listened, that he knows that he's not alone, and Combeferre picks up on it, smiling almost imperceptibly before grimacing.

"He does now. I hope he still will if he needs us later," he muses.

"He will," says Grantaire, and he wishes that he felt as sure as he sounded. "He will."

Combeferre sighs. "Well, you know him best," he says, and gestures back up the staircase. "The others will be wondering where we've got to. Shall we?"

"After you," says Grantaire, and he follows Combeferre back up to where Marius and Éponine are sitting.

When they reach them, Éponine is sitting with her legs crossed and resting up on the table, looking very smug indeed. Marius looks as though he has seen death, and found it personally insulting.

"What have you been doing?" asks Grantaire.

Éponine grins wickedly. "Giving Marius the best advice of his life," she responds.

"I hope not," Marius mutters, and Éponine kicks her feet and shrieks with laughter.

She is wild, thinks Grantaire. Almost feral. He knows why she's never got on with Enjolras.

Éponine eyes Combeferre, and her eyes narrow as he slips himself back into the seat next to her.

"Where's your tea?" she asks.

"They were all out," he replies smoothly, and meets Grantaire's eye.

Grantaire nods. "It took them long enough to find out," he adds. "Thought we'd be there all night."

Éponine doesn't stop looking at them suspiciously all afternoon, but they solve Marius's problem by telling him that no, Cosette won't be angry that he forgot her father's birthday. Grantaire wonders what it must be like for Marius, being so sure and solid with Cosette, and he finds himself ruminating about what might happen if Cosette were to be changed overnight, like Enjolras. If Cosette had to take 20mg of some long-named chemical to get out of bed, and ended up building barricades of kitchen utensils, Grantaire thinks that Marius would just accept it, take it completely in his stride, and carry on as normal.

The thought makes him sad, for some reason that he can't quite discern.

* * *

Grantaire phones Jehan ten minutes before their scheduled visit that Thursday to cancel it. He knows that Bahorel has told Jehan what happened with the green ribbon at the Musain, and he supposes that this is why Jehan doesn't question it; just asks Grantaire when he'll be ready to meet them again.

Grantaire shrugs, even though he knows Jehan can't hear it down the phone, and mumbles something about finishing the colouring of some paintings. After a few moments, Jehan sighs and agrees to meet next week. They sound curt when they bid Grantaire goodbye, hanging up before Grantaire can return the sentiment, and Grantaire doesn't paint at all that day.

* * *

Combeferre corners Grantaire as soon as the meeting is over. Grantaire spots the worried look on his face before he even says anything. He has a right to be worried.

The meeting had gone relatively smoothly at first. Enjolras talked for a few minutes about the issue of choosing a venue for their next fundraiser, before opening the forum for discussion. Bahorel bashfully admitted that his old group of friends had got arrested again on charges pertaining to violent conduct at an event for which they'd done the security, but informed them all that, since they'd no longer be able to use it for boxing practise, his local community centre had a free hall which would be relatively cheap to hire. Everyone agreed that this was a suitable idea, and Bossuet and Joly added that Musichetta would probably let them hire out the entire Musain if the community centre fell through. They'd implied that they'd be able to find means to persuade her, and Éponine had pretended to gag. It had all been jovial and friendly.

Then, Marius had mentioned that he and Cosette were taking a holiday and might be unable to attend the next meeting, and things had crumbled rather quickly. Enjolras' eyes had flashed with barely concealed anger before he accused Marius of being undedicated and not serious enough about the group. He'd followed the accusation with insults about the actions of Marius' father and slights on Marius' relationship with Cosette, and everyone had watched as Marius turned pale and started shaking. Cosette had leapt to her boyfriend's defence, quickly backed up by Éponine, and things had fast descended into a row. Only Musichetta's tactful entrance with a free bottle of wine had calmed things down.

Enjolras values debate more highly than he values most things, and resorting to petty insults and retorts is against all the rules in his book. Grantaire has seen him face down an enraged mob, full of drunken men with stinging tongues and homophobic barbs, and he saw Enjolras win that fight with nothing but facts and rhetoric. Marius has borne the brunt of something that no-one but Grantaire in his darkest moments has ever borne before; the full force of Enjolras' cruel tongue, made sharp by rage, and yet dulled by it too; turned from weapon into wound, from instrument to false note.

Now, everyone has left – Cosette is having a whispered conversation with Éponine out by the staircase, and Enjolras is downstairs talking with Musichetta, Bossuet and Jehan about hiring out the Musain - and Combeferre is approaching Grantaire with a concerned expression.

Grantaire swallows, holding his glass of wine to calm him. He hasn't drunk any of it – yet – but the smell is anchoring, familiar. "I know," he says quietly, as Combeferre stands a few feet away and rubs the bridge of his nose in exasperation.

"It's getting worse," warns Combeferre. "We need to do something."

Grantaire swills the wine around in the glass and watches it still itself. "He's taking the pills. What else can we do?"

"I don't know, Grantaire. I'm not an expert. But we can't just sit back and watch it get worse."

"It might get better."

"It won't."

The wine is suddenly unappealing; it both looks and seems to smell like blood, and Grantaire sets the glass down on the table near him. "I'll handle it," he says. Combeferre raises an eyebrow, and Grantaire frowns. "I will. Just give me more time."

"There might not be much more."

"He's not that bad."

"I know the signs!" Combeferre hisses, his calm façade shattering at Grantaire's denial. He clenches his fists and breathes in harshly, then releases the breath and spreads his fingers, steepling them under his chin. "You can't ignore this."

"And I won't," insists Grantaire. "I won't."

Combeferre looks at him sadly, but nods resignedly and walks away. Grantaire lets out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

When he gets downstairs, Enjolras grabs him and excitedly tells him that he's booked the Musain for the fundraiser, before kissing him full on the mouth in front of everyone. As Enjolras is not usually one for public displays of affection, Grantaire flushes red, and Enjolras laughs. His kiss tasted like red wine.

They make love that evening. Grantaire kisses Enjolras and calls him Apollo, and Enjolras looks at him disapprovingly, although the effect is rather diminished by the fact that he's blushing.

After they've lain in bed for an hour, arguing good-naturedly about the prospect of queer representation in politics – this is practically foreplay to Enjolras, and Grantaire would be lying if he said that he wasn't hoping it might lead to more sex – Enjolras gets up, smiling apologetically. He says he has work to do regarding the fundraiser, and Grantaire shrugs and wishes him luck.

Not that Enjolras ever needs luck, of course, but Grantaire reasons that it can't hurt.

* * *

The next morning, Grantaire wakes up early; long before the sun has had a chance to claim the sky. The bed is cold and empty, and Grantaire thinks how strange it is that this is reassuring. It's a good thing, because it means that Enjolras is awake.

Yawning and stretching, he decides that there's no point in trying to go back to sleep. He's not used to sleeping in a bed by himself any more. He's spoilt in that respect, he supposes.

Fumbling for the door handle, he stumbles out of the bedroom and into the living room. Enjolras is sitting on the sofa, a pile of papers in front of him and a pen in his hand. He's wearing glasses, Grantaire notices with a fond smile, which means that he's been working for some time and his eyes have grown tired.

It's not his healthiest habit, for several reasons: firstly, it proves what Grantaire has always believed, and that is the fact that Enjolras prioritises his work over all other things that should be prioritised, such as food, wine and sex; secondly, Enjolras should rightly wear his glasses all the time, but believes that they make him look foolish, so he doesn't. Of course, Grantaire doesn't think they make him look foolish at all. Quite the opposite, in fact. Most people agree with Grantaire, if the increase in romantic propositions that Enjolras receives when he's wearing his glasses is anything to go by, but Enjolras will not be swayed, and so Grantaire settles for carrying an old pair of Enjolras' reading glasses in his bag, along with a bottle of aspirin (which Enjolras will always refuse to take), just in case.

On hearing Grantaire come in, Enjolras looks up from his stack of papers and beams. It warms something in Grantaire, and he feels himself flush. The full force of one of Enjolras' rare, unguarded smiles is something to behold, especially at 7 in the morning.

"Is it morning already?" asks Enjolras, turning back to his work and shuffling the papers. "I thought it was earlier than that."

Grantaire manages a wry smile. "Earlier than morning?" he asks. "What's earlier than morning?"

Enjolras shrugs. "Yesterday."

"You thought it was yesterday?"

"Well. It might've been." Enjolras looks at Grantaire again. "I started work on this yesterday."

Grantaire frowns. "And you got up early to finish it?"

Enjolras blinks, as though Grantaire is missing the most obvious thing in the world. "No, I stayed up all night." He shrugs. "It needed finishing."

The clock on the far wall suddenly seems too loud for the small space.

"Don't you feel tired?" Grantaire questions.

Enjolras shrugs again. "Not particularly." He beams again, but it doesn't warm Grantaire this time; it chills him beyond the membrane, somewhere deep but not quite to the bone. "It's a good thing, Grantaire! I feel better. I've finished two speeches, planned the next four rallies – and I don't feel tired. Aren't you pleased? I think they worked, the pills. Maybe I won't need to take them for much longer."

He sounds so hopeful that Grantaire almost feels guilty at how the suggestion makes something dark and scared flare in him.

"Are you still taking them?" Grantaire asks carefully.

Enjolras is still smiling, so wide and open that it actually makes something ache in Grantaire; that he can be so innocent and naive about this, as though it's just a passing cloud, and not the hurricane that it really is.

"Yes," answers Enjolras. "That's why I feel better!" He gestures down at himself and grins again. "I'm happy, Grantaire. Or at least I think that's what I am."

"Maybe," says Grantaire dully.

He's seen happiness on the face of Enjolras before. Enjolras wears happiness carefully, all guarded smiles and secretive laughter, and it's nothing like this. Now, he is resplendent in it; dripping with it, overflowing with a grotesque parody of what a desperate man might imagine happiness should be.

Grantaire shudders, and Enjolras tilts his head in confusion. That's a new look, too. Enjolras doesn't usually ascribe it to himself. He doesn't need to, because Enjolras understands most things, and he knows the right questions to ask to work around the things he doesn't.

"What's wrong?" asks Enjolras.

Grantaire shakes his head, taking care to keep his expression neutral and not to show any of his fear. "Nothing," he replies. "I'm just tired."

Enjolras nods. "I was tired once," he says. "For months, all at once. You should go back to sleep. That helped sometimes."

"Yeah," says Grantaire. "Are you coming to bed?"

Enjolras shakes his head. "No, no. I couldn't sleep if I tried. Anyway, there's so many things to do! There's speeches to write, pamphlets to plan – no, you go to bed without me, and I'll come if I get tired."

The 'if' doesn't slip past Grantaire, and he bristles. He wonders if everything is opposite today; if Enjolras has slept so much in the past two months that now he won't sleep at all. It seems entirely possible, unlike almost of all Enjolras's recent actions. The boundaries between the possible and impossible are blurred now. He doesn't know what to expect, and he doesn't know how he should feel about it, or how he does feel about it. He thinks he's confused more than anything, but there's a looming sense of grief there too. It's like he's lost something important, but he can't quite place what it is. It might be Enjolras, but Enjolras is still here, isn't he? He's here, sitting on their sofa, his hair pulled back in an untidy bun, wearing his biggest jumper to keep him warm in their dingy flat. He looks the same. But he isn't, is he?

Grantaire looks at him. Enjolras has turned his attention away from Grantaire and back to his work, and Grantaire thinks he might be holding himself differently now. He seems more alert, almost too acutely so, and his spine is rigid. It's as though he's been changed right down to his bones, his marrow poisoned and drained, leaving his skeleton hollow and ready to be filled with whatever it is that's made Enjolras different.

He thinks about Combeferre and his mother, about how she was normal until she wasn't, and the bitter taste on his tongue grows stronger. It tastes like blood; the thought that perhaps Combeferre's words weren't so much a warning as a premonition.

And then he looks harder at Enjolras, at the fine bones of his wrist where he is sensitive to touches and kisses; at the curve at the nape of his neck where he scratches when he's concentrating; at the length of his eyelashes which he blinks rapidly after periods of focusing so hard that he doesn't blink at all, and he is the same. Grantaire is overreacting. Enjolras built a mountain out of crockery and accused Grantaire of something with Jehan and he didn't sleep all night, but those are small incidents in themselves. Tiny. Insignificant, really. They argue all the time. It's not so unusual.

He can almost believe it. He tells himself this over and over again as he lies awake in bed, the shallow light of the last morning of February saturating the bedroom in watery light. Enjolras is here, he thinks, over again – the same three words over and over, and then over again – and Enjolras is here.

* * *

Éponine sighs, and throws the tea towel which she's using to scrub down the bar over her shoulder. "Come on," she orders. "Spill. Something's wrong, and you're going to tell me what it is."

Grantaire picks at a bit of lacquer on the bar, and shrugs. "There's nothing to tell. It's been a long day."

"It's 11 o'clock, Grantaire," Éponine counters. "A day can't be sufficiently long until the post-lunchtime tedium has set in, and unless you had your lunch at the crack of dawn, then I don't think you're in any position to complain about it."

"I can't be melancholy before lunch?" Grantaire asks playfully, aiming for a diversion, but it misses the mark. Éponine simply raises an eyebrow, and Grantaire exhales heavily. "OK. Fine. I'll tell you. But really, Ép – you have to keep this to yourself. No telling anyone else."

Éponine looks at him a little strangely, but nods. "All right. I promise."

"You really promise?"

She sighs. "What is this, pre-school? Yes, Grantaire, I promise. Pinky swear. Cross my heart and hope to die. I won't tell anyone your sordid little secret."

"It's not sordid," mutters Grantaire, and he takes a deep breath. "I think Enjolras is going mad."

Éponine blinks. "Is that it?" she asks.

"What do you mean, is that it?" Grantaire says. He'd thought it was a fairly bold statement.

Éponine raises an eyebrow. "He's always been mad. He thinks he can change the world from his laptop. He wears skinny jeans and wonders why middle-aged women love him so much. He believes that society is capable of change, despite everyone being inherently selfish and beyond repair. He's never been sane, Grantaire."

"I'm being serious, Ép."

She scoffs, and Grantaire clenches his fists.

"Well, so am I!" she says. "He's probably just overworked. You're always saying yourself that he goes a little manic when he's stressed."

He tries hard to make his voice sound measured, to seem calm and not angry, but he finds himself faltering. "It's not that. I've seen him stressed, and it didn't look like this."

"What does this look like?" she asks, folding her arms. "Because I remember that meeting when he blew a fuse at Marius, and he definitely looked stressed to me. Cosette agreed."

He rubs the bridge of his nose. "It's difficult to explain."

Grantaire doesn't think she'll understand. He has a hunch that, without knowing all the idiosyncrasies of Enjolras' behaviour, Éponine won't think the changes stark enough to merit worrying. He's aware that on their own, Enjolras' acts of strangeness aren't all that strange. They're quirks, at best. Students stay up all night all the time. Lots of people go into cleaning frenzies. Jealousy is a normal human trait, and so is anger. But these things are not normal for Enjolras. That's the problem; Éponine doesn't know what is normal for him.

"Try me," Éponine says.

Grantaire thinks for a moment. "Everything is a blanket," is what he eventually says, and Éponine raises both eyebrows. Grantaire gestures for her to let him finish. "It's like all his normal actions have been covered by it. He's never there any more. Not physically, I mean. He hasn't gone anywhere. But he has, because he's acting different, and it's strange." At Éponine's confused face, he adds, "Combeferre has noticed it."

Éponine nods sagely. "There's your answer," she says, her voice wise.

Grantaire narrows his eyes. "What is?"

"Well, you both care about him, right?" she asks. Grantaire nods. "Well, there you go. You're both worried about him because he's working too much." Grantaire opens his mouth to protest, but she cuts him off. "How many rallies has he planned for this year already? Five? Six?"

"Seven."

"Seven! Why are you even questioning this? He's clearly overworked, stressed out, and needs a break. Best course of action? Take a week off from this dump and drag him to some isolated village in Provençe, or Lille, or somewhere where he can't actually do anything." She pats his shoulder. "Trust me on this, Grantaire. He's fine."

"Yeah," says Grantaire flatly. "OK. I'll do that. Thanks."

"See that you do," she tells him warningly, and then goes to the back room to get more glasses.

Grantaire doesn't know why he thought that she'd understand, but he'd hoped at least that she'd try. Or perhaps she is trying, and this is still all that she can come up with. He finds himself briefly wondering whether Combeferre's mother had been busy or stressed, but cuts that line of thought completely. Enjolras is not the same as Combeferre's mother.

But then Enjolras is not the same as himself any more, and Grantaire is beginning to wonder if there are more parallel lines to be drawn between strangers than he'd first thought.

* * *

"Does Enjolras know you're here?" Jehan asks, sitting cross-legged on the floor and tilting their head at Grantaire curiously.

Grantaire doesn't look up from his canvas. "Not exactly," he tries.

"Grantaire."

He sighs, still not meeting Jehan's eye. "He knows I'm not there." He wipes his mauve-stained fingertips on the old bed sheet on which he's sitting, and draws his fingers through the squirt of saffron paint in his palette. "He doesn't need to know where I am all the time."

Jehan watches Grantaire press his fingers to the canvas and daub the orange-yellow onto the purple, smudging it here and there to create a dull golden hue. "That's not why I asked," they say. Grantaire shrugs and speckles burnt umber onto the canvas with his little finger. He's painting autumn with his bare hands. "You know how he reacted last time you came here."

"We talked about it," lies Grantaire. He halts then, wipes his paint-stained fingers clean and looks at Jehan. "It's fine. We have things to do here, and Enjolras is going through meeting plans with Combeferre. He's not going to say anything. Now, pass me that paintbrush."

Jehan purses their lips. "Grantaire - "

"The finest one in the box, if you can see it. I need to do the detail on the leaves."

"I don't want - "

"We're not talking about this," says Grantaire firmly, hoping that he's injected a sufficient air of finality into his voice for Jehan to listen. Wordlessly, Jehan nods and roots around in Grantaire's wooden box of art supplies, producing the brush. "Thank you," Grantaire says tartly.

There's silence for a few minutes, sacred and golden in a way that silence usually isn't for Grantaire. He normally thinks of silence as something to be filled; the opportunity for a controversial comment, or the perfect opening for an argument. It's not something to be enjoyed in itself, but for the potential it has. At this moment in time, however, he's content to simply revel in it for what it is.

Then, Grantaire hears the sound of ink pen scratching lightly across paper, and he looks up from his work to see Jehan writing furiously. He's half tempted to ignore his curiosity and allow the lingering silence to continue indefinitely, but he's always been one to pry, and so he only lasts a few moments before setting his paintbrush down. "What are you writing?" he asks.

"Questions you won't answer," Jehan replies curtly. A section of their unbraided hair falls over their shoulder, disturbed by their movement, and they tuck it behind their ear. "You won't let me ask them, so I thought I might as well write them down. At least that way I can say I tried."

"Look, I can't - "

"I'm supposed to be your friend, Grantaire. We're supposed to trust each other." Jehan sets their mouth in a thin line, trying to settle their irritation before continuing. "I've let you see all my unfinished work and I've told you how I drink my tea, and in return you've sat on my floor and refused to tell me anything. How can we work together on this if you don't trust me?"

Grantaire looks at them, imploring them to understand. "It's not that I don't trust you. Really. It's just that things with Enjolras... well, they're hard at the moment."

Jehan's face softens almost imperceptibly, and they tilt their head slightly in interested sympathy. "Are you sure it wouldn't help to talk about it?"

He shakes his head. "It wouldn't do any good. It's not the sort of thing anyone can help with."

Jehan hums. "Did I ever tell you about how Courfeyrac and I finally got together?"

Grantaire's lips quirk into a smile, grateful at the change of topic. "No."

"Well," begins Jehan, "if you must know, Enjolras sat us both down after a meeting and told us – what was it he told us? Oh yes – that our sexual tension was distracting everyone from the cause. We sorted ourselves out pretty quickly after that."

Grantaire laughs gently. "I've told him before about boundaries," he says.

"I didn't mind," says Jehan. "I got something excellent out of it." They watch Grantaire for a second before carrying on. "The point I'm trying to make is that I am very, very happy right now, and it's all thanks to Enjolras. If I can repay that in any way at all, then I would really like to do that."

Grantaire wonders how many people Enjolras has affected in his lifetime, how many people would want to make him better just to say thank you. He's seen the enraptured faces of the crowds at rallies and marches, and he's listened to the people who stop Enjolras in the street just to thank him for his work. He thinks the number might be very high indeed.

He cracks. "Enjolras is ill," he says. "And don't ask me to tell you with what, because I don't know, and even if I did, Enjolras wouldn't want me to tell anyone. But he's not well at the moment, mentally speaking, and I don't want to make him worse." He shrugs. "For now, the best thing you can do to help him is to not tell him that I'm here. He's not being rational right now. He'll assume the worst."

Jehan bites a bit of skin from around the nail of their index finger. "Fuck."

"Yeah," breathes Grantaire. "I know."

"No, but Grantaire," says Jehan. "Really, that's... that's shit. For someone like Enjolras, especially."

Grantaire knows what they mean, and he sees a sort of bitter truth in it. For someone like Enjolras to lose his mind, when his mind is his greatest asset – greater than the soft curve of his cupid's bow and the straight planes of his lithe figure, greater even than the steel in his eyes when he's arguing and the gold in his hair when the sun is highest - losing control of his thoughts is the cruellest punishment imaginable. If a fool were to lose their mind, Grantaire thinks, then it would be sad – of course it would be sad, because a mind isn't like a cent, shouldn't be able to be lost at the drop of a hat – but when a genius loses their mind, then it is sacrilege. Like a painter losing his sight, or a musician losing her hearing. Enjolras has lost the most important tool of his trade, the tallest pillar of his identity, and it is a tragedy.

"I know," he says again, not sure what else there is to say.

Jehan breathes out heavily. "I'm sorry I pushed it," they say, "and I won't ask any more questions if you can't answer them. But I meant it. If there's anything I can do, even if it's just as small as covering for you when he asks where you are if you think that'll keep him from worrying, then I'll do it."

Grantaire smiles. It feels as though a weight has been lifted. A very light one, perhaps, but it's still progress. "Thank you," he says, and then he has a completely unrelated thought. "About that poem you wouldn't let me see last time – "

"Nope," says Jehan, looking back at their paper and scribbling a huge black cloud over their questions. "You're still not ready."

Grantaire flicks a bit of paint at them, and they stick their tongue out. The air between them feels lighter, and no longer weighted down by quite as much guilt, Grantaire finishes his painting long before he gets the text from Combeferre that makes him throw down his paints, heart swelling and faltering, and, ignoring Jehan's concerned cries, rush out of Jehan's building, fingers still smeared with all the hues of his work.


End file.
